cellphone

cellphone:

see cellular telephonecellular telephoneor cellular radio,telecommunications system in which a portable or mobile radio transmitter and receiver, or "cellphone," is linked via microwave radio frequencies to base transmitter and receiver stations that connect the user to a conventional.....Click the link for more information..

cellphone

(CELLular telePHONE) The first ubiquitous wireless telephone. Originally analog, all cellular systems today are digital, which has enabled the cellphone to turn into a handheld personal computer (see smartphone and cellphones vs. smartphones). A cellphone is also called a "mobile," "mobile phone," "handset" or "cell."

Introduced in the mid-1980s, cellphone sales exploded worldwide in the 1990s. By 2008, with three billion units in use, the cellphone became an addiction for many people, who would never leave their house without it (see nomophobia). By 2012, there were more than 300 million cellphone subscriptions (including smartphones) in the U.S.

Major Carriers In the U.S., the major cellular carriers are AT&T Mobility (formerly Cingular), Verizon Wireless (formerly Bell Atlantic Mobile and Alltel), Sprint (merger of Sprint and Nextel) and T-Mobile. The largest cellular companies in the world are China Mobile and UK-based Vodafone.

Cell Technology Geographic areas are divided into a number of slightly overlapping circular "cells." Each cell contains a base station, which is identifiable by its transmitting and receiving antenna located on a tower at the top of a hill or building. The base stations connect to the landline telephone system of the country and to the Internet.

The cellular system uses multiple base stations to cover a geographic area. As the mobile phone user travels from cell to cell, the call is automatically "handed off" to the next station. The more cells, the greater number of customers can be handled at the same time, because the same frequencies are reused within each cell.

As Europeans began to use their new-fangled Ericsson phones in the late 1800s, could they have imagined today's smartphones? Photo taken at Antoni Gaudi's famous "La Pedrera" apartment house in Barcelona.

Since mobile phones are programmed to connect automatically to the strongest cellphone tower signal, the device -- or "dirtbox" -- used by the Marshals Service mimics this signal in order to ensure connectivity.

Christchurch electromagnetic frequency expert Martin Gledhill, who has been tracking global research into the risks of cellphone use, said the latest findings from Britain's Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research Programme (MTHR) supported the conclusions of specialist health groups who found no persuasive evidence of health effects from exposure to radiofrequency (RF) fields.

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